Democracy Grief: Democrats Are Nervous Over Crappy Field, Trump Economy Doing Great

By William Teach December 14, 2019 – 7:07 am

Democracy grief is real, and Democrats are living it. They seem rather upset that there are a whole bunch of people running for the nomination, which happens most years

Democrats Agree on One Thing: They’re Very, Very Nervous

The past three years have not been easy for the political fortunes or the emotional health of America’s Democrats. To the extent they feel optimistic about anything, they have been waiting for the 2020 election in the way inhabitants of a storm-ravaged city might look toward the end of hurricane season — as an opportunity to restore order not just to their fractured physical world, but to their battered psyches.

Why, then, even with the potential catharsis of impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump underway, do so many feel so awful?

“My big fear is that we are not coalescing around one candidate, and I don’t know in the end if there’s enough people who will come out and vote,” said Mac Macnair, a Democrat who lives in a deep-red county in rural Georgia. “Four years is as long as I can go, but eight years — we won’t even have an America left.”

See, if Trump wins, America is gone. LOL. Perhaps they aren’t coalescing because their candidates stink? Seriously, this happens all the time. If it’s May and there’s no coalescing, then worry.

Some people are suffering from general political angst. Others have specific qualms: a concern that their favorite candidate lacks that essential quality, electability; a worry that fellow Democrats will become disillusioned if their chosen candidate fails to get the nomination and will vote for a third-party candidate, or for Trump, or for no one at all — the “Bernie or Nobody” scenario.

A sampling of interviews with Democrats in different parts of the country reveals that worry comes in many forms.

From Jobetta Hedelman-Beaver, 39, of Kennewick, Washington: “I’m anxious about Trump. I’m super-anxious about him. I blame him for my high blood pressure.”

I don’t remember the Bush deranged folks dropping that bit of blamestorming on him.

From Katie Matlin, 40, in Northbrook, Illinois: “My husband has major anxiety around the election. We actually cannot watch news coverage in our house because any news about Donald Trump triggers his anxiety.”

From David Kaye, 37, in Milwaukee: “During previous elections, I’d have a giant spreadsheet and follow every candidate. But it’s not fun anymore. It’s still just as important, but it triggers my anxiety, and sometimes it triggers panic attacks. I’m not following out of interest or a sense of fun, but out of a sense of not wanting our civilization to fall.”

Snowflakes.

Fear That Good News for the President is Bad News for the Democrats

The stock market is roaring. Unemployment is at a record low. The economy added 266,000 new jobs in November. Though these things are objectively good, of course, they are less good if you are a Democrat and you don’t want the current president to get credit for anything that might help him get reelected.

In other words, what’s good for the country is bad for Democrats. I’m looking forward with glee to watch Democrats melt down even more than usual. How about you?

Read: Democracy Grief: Democrats Are Nervous Over Crappy Field, Trump Economy Doing Great »

Posted in Democrats, Special Snowflake Syndrome | 16 Comments | Trackback URL

Democracy Grief Is Real Or Something

By William Teach December 13, 2019 – 5:12 pm

Michelle Goldberg at the NY Times thinks she’s on to something as the people who refuse to accept the outcomes of elections when they lose (see 2000, 2004, 2016). Oh, and like the massacre in Britain

Yeah, they’re losing their minds. Hence we get this, which manages to link Hotcoldwetdry in the mix, as well!

Democracy Grief Is Real

The despair felt by climate scientists and environmentalists watching helplessly as something precious and irreplaceable is destroyed is sometimes described as “climate grief.” Those who pay close attention to the ecological calamity that civilization is inflicting upon itself frequently describe feelings of rage, anxiety and bottomless loss, all of which are amplified by the right’s willful denial. The young activist Greta Thunberg, Time Magazine’s 2019 Person of the Year, has described falling into a deep depression after grasping the ramifications of climate change and the utter refusal of people in power to rise to the occasion: “If burning fossil fuels was so bad that it threatened our very existence, how could we just continue like before?”

Lately, I think I’m experiencing democracy grief. For anyone who was, like me, born after the civil rights movement finally made democracy in America real, liberal democracy has always been part of the climate, as easy to take for granted as clean air or the changing of the seasons. When I contemplate the sort of illiberal oligarchy that would await my children should Donald Trump win another term, the scale of the loss feels so vast that I can barely process it.

After Trump’s election, a number of historians and political scientists rushed out with books explaining, as one title put it, “How Democracies Die.” In the years since, it’s breathtaking how much is dead already. Though the president will almost certainly be impeached for extorting Ukraine to aid his re-election, he is equally certain to be acquitted in the Senate, a tacit confirmation that he is, indeed, above the law. His attorney general is a shameless partisan enforcer. Professional civil servants are purged, replaced by apparatchiks. The courts are filling up with young, hard-right ideologues. One recently confirmed judge, 40-year-old Steven Menashi, has written approvingly of ethnonationalism.

LOL

The entire Trump presidency has been marked, for many of us who are part of the plurality that despises it, by anxiety and anger. But lately I’ve noticed, and not just in myself, a demoralizing degree of fear, even depression. You can see it online, in the self-protective cynicism of liberals announcing on Twitter that Trump is going to win re-election. In The Washington Post, Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush and a Never Trump conservative, described his spiritual struggle against feelings of political desperation: “Sustaining this type of distressed uncertainty for long periods, I can attest, is like putting arsenic in your saltshaker.”

Read: Democracy Grief Is Real Or Something »

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If All You See…

By William Teach December 13, 2019 – 1:00 pm

…is an area flooded from other people eating meat, you just might be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Victory Girls Blog, with a post on Britain voting against Jeremy Corbyn’s radicalism.

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Say, What Does America Look Like After Hotcoldwetdry?

By William Teach December 13, 2019 – 10:34 am

It’s total doom, you guys

America After Climate Change, Mapped

In 100 years, what will a United States transformed by climate change look like? At this point, you don’t have to use much imagination to predict what’s coming: Temperatures will continue to climb; sea levels will continue to rise. And, by the 2060s, the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that global migration patterns will bring 100 million new people into the country, who will settle from coast to coast.

Almost everything else about the climate of tomorrow and the nation’s ability to survive it is less inevitable, however, says Billy Fleming, the director of the University of Pennsylvania’s McHarg Center for Urbanism and Ecology. “There are certain general things we’re certain about, but the shape and content of the future is not one of them,” he said. “We get the future we build for ourselves.”

With other researchers from the McHarg Center, he designed a series of maps of the U.S. for an online collection dubbed The 2100 Project: An Atlas for A Green New Deal. The website use a variety of projected and current data sources to sketch out the country’s possible fate, displaying its geography in economic, ecological, agricultural, and ideological terms. Climate models vary, as do timelines and confidence intervals for each map. But collectively, Fleming says the images provide visual evidence that it’s not too late for grand interventions to make a fundamental difference. Ambitious proposals like the Green New Deal—which involves a dramatic overhaul of the nation’s energy and building infrastructure—could be the key, he said.

So, what does it look like?

I’m going to leave the graphic full size, and how that it shrinks according to browser size. See, because you ate meat and drove to work, there will be earthquakes in places that get earthquakes (yes, that red blob in the middle is correct, that’s the New Madrid seismic zone), hurricanes and floods in places that get hurricanes and floods, and wildfires in places that get wildfires. Because these things never happened before the fossil fueled engine, you know.

This is how insane this cult is, especially the earthquakes thing.

Read: Say, What Does America Look Like After Hotcoldwetdry? »

Posted in AGW Scaremongering, Global Warming | 10 Comments | Trackback URL

Bummer: European Union’s Green New Deal Fails First Test

By William Teach December 13, 2019 – 7:05 am

The EU attempted to pass a Green New Deal, which is totally about ‘climate change’ and not everything else, especially controlling the economy, because the unaccountable politicians running the EU don’t want power at all, right?

Europe’s Green Deal on climate change failed its first test

In a stunning disappointment to environmentalists, a bid to cut the European Union’s greenhouse gas emissions to nearly zero by 2050 flopped at a key summit in Brussels. Today’s decision was the first test of whether the newly proposed European Green Deal — which promises to totally overhaul the continent’s economy — might turn into real action on climate change. Just one country, Poland, was the hold-out on the deal.

The Council released its final conclusions that said that while it supports the 2050 goal, “one member state at this stage cannot commit to implement this objective as far as it is concerned, and the European Council will come back to this in June 2020.”

  1. I thought there was a planetary emergency? No?

If the goal had passed unanimously, Europe would have become the biggest economic bloc yet to set a goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050 — meaning it would have nearly eliminated planet-heating pollution from burning fossil fuels and drawn down any remaining carbon it releases. That’s a target necessary to save lives and avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change, according to scientists on the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The United Nations climate conference wraps up in Madrid on December 13th, where activists and delegates are pushing countries to up their commitments to reducing carbon emissions under the Paris climate accord. (snip)

The Green Deal includes measures to cut emissions from transportation, make buildings more energy efficient, increase renewable energy sources, protect biodiversity, and make agriculture more sustainable. It also calls for the introduction of regulations designed to reduce industrial waste and encourage companies to increase reuse and recycling. It signals the adoption of a “zero pollution action plan” for air water and soil in 2021. It also pushes for new trade policies that could penalize countries like the US that are uncooperative in global efforts to tackle climate change. It allocates 100 billion euros for regions of the world most likely to be upended by the changes, as part of an effort to ensure a “just transition” towards a greener economy and society.

So, the EU wants to destroy the economies of European countries while imposing massive controls on businesses and citizens, all while redistributing money to non-EU nations. Good luck with net zero. Guess they won’t be able to have another climate change conference in Europe, considering the almost 25,000 who took fossil fueled trips. Europe will have to get rid of all their airports, military bases, roads, and so forth.

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Posted in Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 8 Comments | Trackback URL

Democrat Postpone Impeachment Theater Vote Till Friday, Supposedly

By William Teach December 13, 2019 – 6:53 am

I wonder how many so-called moderate Democrats will go missing for the vote today, provided they have it?

House panel adjourns, to vote Friday on articles of impeachment

The House Judiciary Committee spent more than 14 hours Thursday locked in a rancorous and contentious debate about whether to approve two articles of impeachment against President Trump, with Democrats making an abrupt decision before midnight to hold off on the history-making vote until Friday morning.

The debate ended as it began, with angry exchanges, personal insults and recycled arguments about process and propriety as the committee moved toward voting to impeach Trump for “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

“It has been a long two days of consideration of these articles, and it is now very late at night,” said Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), at 11:15 p.m. “I want the members on both sides of the aisle to think about what has happened over these last two days and to search their consciences before we cast our final votes.”

Trump faces impeachment for “abuse of power” and “obstruction of Congress” over his dealings with Ukraine. Democrats allege that Trump withheld military aid and a White House meeting while pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to launch political investigations targeting Democrats. Trump’s blanket refusal to cooperate with the Democratic investigation is the basis of the “obstruction of Congress” impeachment article.

If you have to put the charges in quotes, that should tell you how silly and bullshit they are. If there wasn’t an unhinged, ultra-partisan, TrumpDerangementSyndome investigation to start with, there would be no “obstruction of Congress”. Considering how much Obama ignored Congress and Democrats were fine with that, must not be particularly serious.

(Breitbart) House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) offered a bizarre justification Thursday for ignoring House rules requiring him to allow Republicans to call witnesses: it did not say he had to do so on a particular day.

The existing resolution authorizing the impeachment inquiry, H. Res. 660, allows the Ranking Member of the committee to call witnesses — subject to the approval of the chair and a majority vote by the whole committee.

Failing that, Republicans invoked House of Representatives Rule XI 12(j)(1), which requires the chairs of House committees to allow the members of the minority party to hold a full day of hearings featuring their own witnesses.

But, Jerry is playing games, so

Reading from a prepared text, Nadler argued: “The House rule does not require me to schedule a hearing on a particular day, nor does it require me to schedule the hearing as a condition precedent to taking any specific legislative action.”

In other words, he interpreted the rule as allowing him to schedule the minority witness hearing after the articles of impeachment had already passed.

If Democrats pass their little impeachment thing today, you can bet those witnesses will be called in the Senate, along with Adam Schiff, and perhaps Nadler himself. They might ask Joe Biden and Hunter Biden to come explain things.

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ClimaGrinches Now Coming After Christmas Cards

By William Teach December 12, 2019 – 10:50 pm

As Christmas draws nearer and the climate conference in Madrid ends, expect this kind of Crazy to ramp up

Climate change: Primary school bans children from sending Christmas cards to help protect the environment

A headteacher of an English primary school has banned students from sending Christmas cards out of concern for the environment.

Jonathan Mason, head of Belton Lane Primary School in Grantham, Lincolnshire, said the holiday tradition contributes to carbon emissions.

He also claimed a number of “concerned” students had approached him regarding the environmental impact of Christmas cards in the school.

“Throughout the world, we send enough cards that if we placed them alongside each other, they’d cover the world’s circumference 500 times. The manufacture of Christmas cards is contributing to our ever-growing carbon emissions,” Mason told parents in a letter, published by the Daily Mail.

“So in order to be environmentally friendly in school we will not be having a post box for Christmas cards from this year onwards.”

Mason has since been labelled as a “grinch” by a number of unhappy parents, claiming the headteacher had “the joy taken out of Christmas”.

Don’t let these joyless climascolds ruin anything. Instead, ask them if they still use energy at their homes, eat meat, take fossil fueled travel.

Read: ClimaGrinches Now Coming After Christmas Cards »

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Bummer: Trump Just Got His 50th Judge Confirmed

By William Teach December 12, 2019 – 2:30 pm

How’s that impeachment theater going, Dems?

Obama only got 55 appointed in 8 years. But, it’s even better

(Fox) The Republican-controlled Senate on Wednesday afternoon confirmed Lawrence VanDyke to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, marking President Trump’s 50th successful appellate court appointment in just three years in office, and his second to the historically liberal 9th Circuit in as many days.

By contrast, President Barack Obama nominated a total of 55 circuit judges who were confirmed over eight years — and Obama’s nominees were, on average, approximately ten years older. The White House has dramatically transformed the 9th Circuit, a powerful court with jurisdiction over nine states and Guam that has long been a thorn in the president’s side.

Of the 30 active seats on the 9th Circuit, 10 have now been appointed by Trump, and 14 by Republican presidents. Only nine of the court’s 19 semi-retired “senior status” judges were appointed by Democrats, with 10 by Republicans. That’s a major change from early last year, when only six of the active judges on the 9th Circuit were chosen by Republicans.

Turning the 9th Conservative.

Read: Bummer: Trump Just Got His 50th Judge Confirmed »

Posted in Current Affairs, Donald Trump | 16 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach December 12, 2019 – 1:00 pm

…is day made hazy by carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is The Right Scoop, with a post on an unhinged teacher ripping a Trump pin off a female student.

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Young Climate Cultists Rush Stage At COP25 After Long Fossil Fueled Trips

By William Teach December 12, 2019 – 10:30 am

One has to wonder how many took long fossil fueled trips just to raise their fists in socialism

The Future Is Calling, and It Says Act Now or We’re All Fucked

On Wednesday, young climate activists rushed the main stage at the United Nations climate talks in Madrid in protest. The talks—dubbed COP25 in UN-speak—are the latest iteration of a 25-year exercise in futility, broken promises, and negligence. And young adults are sick of it.

Carbon emissions have continued to rise to record highs almost every year despite dire warnings. Greta Thunberg urged those gathered at COP25 to listen to the warnings from scientists, but the group of young adults on the stage were a more potent reminder of what those reports say. They’re data incarnate, the people who have to live with the findings in those science reports and the choices we make.

So, black power fists or

But at the dawn of the most important decade in human history, this type of connection between small islands and young adults holds the promise of a realignment of power. Climate talks (and world governments in general) continue to be under the sway of fossil fuel interests, subsidizing our demise. Without a realignment in power and priorities, we’re screwed. Because make no mistake, unchecked climate change will eventually come for all us without the ability to buy a private jet or Cybertruck. Young adults and small islands will just be the first to feel its wrath and live with the impacts the longest.

“Small islands don’t need to be told to be ambitious because, for us, climate change is an emergency that already affects our lives today,” Miguel van der Velden, a 22-year-old climate activist from Aruba, told Earther via WhatsApp message. “But I think that the youth movement will be essential for raising ambition in the Global North.

I’m doubting Miguel took a sailboat to Madrid. Further, tourism is the primary driver of Aruba’s economy, with just about everything linked to it. Perhaps we need to shut down the airport, the cruise ship ports, the construction, hotels, etc, so Aruba can be carbon neutral, right? Oh, wait, no, they just want the redistributed cash.

Read: Young Climate Cultists Rush Stage At COP25 After Long Fossil Fueled Trips »

Posted in AGW Socialism, Global Warming | 5 Comments | Trackback URL
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